Shares in Alliance Aviation Services lost nearly half their value today after it announced a major profit downgrade following reduced work in Queensland, with the company now hoping to pick up extra work in Western Australia.

For the best ringside seat at a bruising encounter don’t buy a ticket to a boxing event, sign up for an iron ore forecasting conference which will, for the first time since prices crashed, put the big boys of the industry on the same podium as the small producers.

The Business News annual export review has the latest data on 33 businesses representing $122 billion in outgoing trade. It also shows that while iron ore continues to dominate, the emergence of LNG, agriculture and services will benefit from a lower dollar.

Western Australia-based Southern Cross Electrical Engineering has won a $25 million contract with BHP Billiton Iron Ore for electrical and instrumentation works at the Yarnima power station near Newman.

BHP Billiton Iron Ore president Jimmy Wilson says the mining giant is likely to request government intervention to prevent a "devastating" proposed strike at Port Hedland which could cost miners up to $100 million a day.

BHP Billiton’s annual meeting in Perth today resembled a debate on climate change, with chairman Jac Nasser expressing frustration that the company’s achievements in that field were not being recognised.